Friday, June 29, 2012
A Reminder for "Aboriginal Skies" at the Adelaide Planetarium
This is a reminder that the Adelaide Planetarium at the University of South Australia is presenting, as part of their 40th Anniversary celebrations, "Aboriginal Skies" with Paul Curnow. You can see Paul talking about Aboriginal skies here.
There were six seats left on Friday Afternoon.
The show is on
Saturday 30th of June 2012 at 7:30pm – 9:30pm
Adelaide Planetarium,
Building P
Mawson Lakes Campus,
University of South Australia
Cost $30.00 per person. Enrolments are subject to the seating capacity of the planetarium. To make a booking or for further information phone 8302 3138 or email the planetarium at adelaide.planetarium@unisa.edu.au.
Adelaide Planetarium,
Building P
Mawson Lakes Campus,
University of South Australia
Cost $30.00 per person. Enrolments are subject to the seating capacity of the planetarium. To make a booking or for further information phone 8302 3138 or email the planetarium at adelaide.planetarium@unisa.edu.au.
Labels: Astronomy, Public Lecture
Mercury, 27 June 2012
Mercury is at it highest in the evening sky on 1 July, but is pretty easy to see at the moment. Just keep on going right from Sirius and Procyon and it's the next brightest thing in line with them.
Labels: Mercury
Thursday, June 28, 2012
Reflections on Venus
I had to go to Melbourne for work this week. This involved getting up at dark o'clock, driving through the early morning wisps of fog and drinking expensive airport coffee in an attempt to stay awake. Luckily we took off before the fog thickened, grounding subsequent flights.
Flying into Melbourne, before we flew below the cloud, I got to see Venus and Jupiter floating together above the wing of my aircraft, as the sky brightened with the on coming sunrise.
This got me to thinking. All those videos and pictures that are taken either pointing at or very close to the Sun, that purport to show unknown planets, if these objects really were planets rather than lens flares, internal reflections, clouds or aircraft, why don't we see them after sunset?
Just in case you need reminding, one of my hobbies is observing and photographing Venus in the daylight. With a little preparation you can relatively easily see Venus in the daylight (although it helps if the Moon is nearby to provide a guide). Even Jupiter can be seen in the daylight under special circumstances.
Photographing Venus in the daylight is much more of a pain than just seeing it. You generally need to wait until late afternoon, and carefully hide the Sun behind some bulky object to be rewarded with a faint white dot that can be barely seen on your image.
Venus
(bright dot to the upper right of the image) above the Moon on
September 11, 2010. This image taken with my Canon IXUS 100 IS on 3x
zoom, auto exposure. Taken approximately 3:00 pm.Now, Venus can be seen down to 5 degrees from the Sun, these objects should be blindingly obvious moments after sunset (or before sunrise). Even if they were only as bright as Venus, an object 10 degrees from the Sun as bright as Venus would be startlingly obvious, especially to the legions of folks like me who get up in the early morn, or race out after sunset to take images of planets like Venus, Jupiter and Mercury. Even if there is a run of bad weather, these "objects" have been reported over a substantial period of time, and would have been easily seen if they represented a real planet.
Speaking of Venus, we just observed the Transit of Venus, where the position of Venus was measured with outstanding accuracy by hordes of professional and amateur astronomers and school kids world wide. If there was a substantial planet that had been lurking in the inner solar system for months Venus's orbit would be so messed up by that planets gravity that it would have been obvious even in crude timings.
And what about the STEREO and SOHO satellites? These scrutinize the near solar environment and any object that comes within binocular distance of the Sun will be picked up. I regularly see Venus, Mercury, Jupiter, Saturn and even Uranus in the STEREO images as they pass into the twilight. If there is a planet bright enough to be picked up by amateur photographers lurking near the sun, why hasn't it turned up in the STEREO imagers?
So if these objects captured in video cameras are planets, they are unusual planets that are brighter than Venus in cameras, but invisible to the unaided eye, invisible to the STEREO and SOHO cameras that can pick up faint asteroids and have no gravitational force.
Or they could be lens artefacts from pointing a camera nearly directly at the Sun. What do you think?
Labels: Daylight, Pseudoscience, public outreach, science communicators, Venus
Tuesday, June 26, 2012
The Sky This Week - Thursday June 28 to Thursday July 5
The Full Moon is Wednesday July 4. Mars is in the western
evening sky. Saturn is
visible near the star Spica in the northern sky and is visited by the Moon on the 28th. In the morning skies
Jupiter and Venus can be seen close together on July 1. Mercury is visible low in the evening twilight.
Morning sky on Sunday
July 1 looking east as seen from Adelaide at 6:30 am local
time in South Australia.
Jupiter is near Venus in the Hyades, making a sline with the red star Aldebaran.The the Pleiades cluster is close byThe inset shows the telescopic view of Venus. Similar views will be seen elsewhere at the equivalent local time (click to embiggen).
Jupiter climbs higher in the morning sky this week. It is now reasonably easy to see. Jupiter moves towards Venus and the Hyades over the week, being closest to Venus on July 1, when it forms a straight line with the red star Aldebaran.
With the Pleiades cluster and the constellation of Orion close by, this is a beautiful morning sight.
Bright white Venus climbs higher above the horizon this week. Venus is an obvious crescent seen through even a small telescope. Venus travels through "A" shaped Hyades cluster, and makes a line with the bright red star Aldebaran and Jupiter.
Evening sky looking west as seen from Adelaide at 5:45 pm local time on Saturday June 30 showing
Mercury above the horizon. Similar views will be seen
elsewhere at the equivalent local time. Click to embiggen.
The Full Moon is Wednesday July 4.
Mercury is at its highest in the evening sky this week. It is still best seen with a flat, uncluttered horizon.
Mars is in the constellation of Virgo. It's brightest object in the north-western sky, and its distinctive red colour makes it easy to spot. Mars is at its highest in the northern sky around 5:30 pm local time and sets shortly after 11:30 pm.
Mars moves away from the bright star beta Virginis this week
Mars was at opposition on March 4, when it was biggest and brightest as seen from Earth. Sadly, this is a poor opposition and Mars will be fairly small in modest telescopes.
Saturn is above the north-western horizon, not far from the bright star Spica. Saturn is high enough in the northern sky for telescopic observation in the evening, being highest at 7:00 pm local time.Saturn was at opposition, when it is biggest and brightest as seen from Earth, on the 16th of April, but now is still a great time for telescopic views of this ringed world. Saturn and Spica are visited by the waxing Moon on the 28th, with the Moon being very close to Spica.
With Saturn still reasonably high in the sky, there are lots of interesting things in the sky to view with a telescope. If you don't have a telescope, now is a good time to visit one of your local astronomical societies open nights or the local planetariums.
Printable PDF maps of the Eastern sky at 10 pm AEDST, Western sky at 10 pm AEDST. For further details and more information on what's up in the sky, see Southern Skywatch.
Cloud cover predictions can be found at SkippySky.
Morning sky on Sunday
July 1 looking east as seen from Adelaide at 6:30 am local
time in South Australia. Jupiter is near Venus in the Hyades, making a sline with the red star Aldebaran.The the Pleiades cluster is close byThe inset shows the telescopic view of Venus. Similar views will be seen elsewhere at the equivalent local time (click to embiggen).
Jupiter climbs higher in the morning sky this week. It is now reasonably easy to see. Jupiter moves towards Venus and the Hyades over the week, being closest to Venus on July 1, when it forms a straight line with the red star Aldebaran.
With the Pleiades cluster and the constellation of Orion close by, this is a beautiful morning sight.
Bright white Venus climbs higher above the horizon this week. Venus is an obvious crescent seen through even a small telescope. Venus travels through "A" shaped Hyades cluster, and makes a line with the bright red star Aldebaran and Jupiter.
Evening sky looking west as seen from Adelaide at 5:45 pm local time on Saturday June 30 showing
Mercury above the horizon. Similar views will be seen
elsewhere at the equivalent local time. Click to embiggen.The Full Moon is Wednesday July 4.
Mercury is at its highest in the evening sky this week. It is still best seen with a flat, uncluttered horizon.
Mars is in the constellation of Virgo. It's brightest object in the north-western sky, and its distinctive red colour makes it easy to spot. Mars is at its highest in the northern sky around 5:30 pm local time and sets shortly after 11:30 pm.
Mars moves away from the bright star beta Virginis this week
Mars was at opposition on March 4, when it was biggest and brightest as seen from Earth. Sadly, this is a poor opposition and Mars will be fairly small in modest telescopes.
Saturn is above the north-western horizon, not far from the bright star Spica. Saturn is high enough in the northern sky for telescopic observation in the evening, being highest at 7:00 pm local time.Saturn was at opposition, when it is biggest and brightest as seen from Earth, on the 16th of April, but now is still a great time for telescopic views of this ringed world. Saturn and Spica are visited by the waxing Moon on the 28th, with the Moon being very close to Spica.
With Saturn still reasonably high in the sky, there are lots of interesting things in the sky to view with a telescope. If you don't have a telescope, now is a good time to visit one of your local astronomical societies open nights or the local planetariums.
Printable PDF maps of the Eastern sky at 10 pm AEDST, Western sky at 10 pm AEDST. For further details and more information on what's up in the sky, see Southern Skywatch.
Cloud cover predictions can be found at SkippySky.
Labels: weekly sky
Monday, June 25, 2012
Carnival of Space #255 is Here!
Carnival of Space #255 is now up at Vintage Space. There's lakes on Titan, strange formations on Mars, Chinese women in space, and much, much more. Zap on over and have a read.
Labels: carnival of space
Astounding Southern Hemisphere Auroral Image From Space
Follow this link to to see an amazing image of the Aurora Australis from space.
Labels: aurora, spacecraft
Sunday, June 24, 2012
Cool Turing Stuff.
In honour of the 100 years of computer pioneer and code breaker Alan Turing, I give you two cool Turing machines
This elegant one with real paper tape and a Lego Turing Machine (for mega awesome)
This elegant one with real paper tape and a Lego Turing Machine (for mega awesome)
Labels: miscelaneous, science
Pluto 23 to 24-06-12
Pluto tends to be ignored a lot by us, after all, even though it is an iconic planet,it's just a dot in most peoples equipment. But it's still fun to do animations of Pluto. My animated GIF of this is here.
Also, between 28 June to 2 April Pluto will be skimming past the open cluster M25, this will be worth some shots.
Labels: animation, iTelescope, Pluto
Saturday, June 23, 2012
Comet C/2011 F1 LINEAR, 22 June 2012
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Right Panel: NGC 5377. Both comet and galaxy cropped from the larger T20 frame
I still suck at colour astrophotography.
Friday, June 22, 2012
International Space Station, June 3 2012
Thursday, June 21, 2012
Globular Cluster M13 in Hercules
Luminance images were stacked in ImageJ then the red, green, blue and stacked luminance images assembled using the Merge Channels tool. Click to embiggen.
It's official, I suck at colour astrophotography. :-(
Labels: astrophotography, cluster, imageJ, iTelescope
I'm in the Best Australian Science Writing 2012 anthology
You may or may not be aware that I also blog for The Conversation on things related to my day job, pharmacology and toxicology (see the links in the left-hand panel of this blog).
Well, my Conversation article ‘Doctors' orders: debunking homeopathy once and for all’, will be included in The Best Australian Science Writing 2012 anthology.
This is really exciting! As far back as I can remember, I wanted to be two things, a scientist and a writer. While my popular (as opposed to my academic) writing has been in anthologies before (the Open Lab, see side bar), and I've been published in Sky and Space and Australian Sky and Telescope, this is the first time where my writing more or less directly relates to my professional work.
I love my astronomy, but I also love the research and science I do during the day. I've always felt a little sad that people are really interested in my astronomy writings, but less so about my areas of research.
Being asked to do a regular column for The Conversation that actully revolved around the science I do was a great step forward. Being accepted into The Best Australian Science Writing antology is the icing on the cake.
Many years back, when flares were cool, I entered some of my Science-Fiction writing into a competition to earn a place in a week long writing workshop. I won a place in the work shop and at the end of the week, I knew one thing for certain:
I was not a fiction writer.
Yet I didn't stop writing. I concentrated first on my academic and professional writing. In the last 20 years I've published 46 papers and four professional book chapters. Then the internet came, I discussed science on internet fora, became involved in the Talk.Origins group, set up Southern Skywatch and wrote, and wrote. Then blogs came along. I started up astroblog, joined the Panda's Thumb collective. And wrote.
So I've achived my childhood dream. I'm a scientist and a writer. I'm not Carl Sagan or Richard Feinmann, but through Astrobog, The Panda's Thumb and the The Conversation I can bring the world that I love, the world of science, to a wider audience. In one way this is better than my far off dream of being a science fiction writer.
Because I'm writing about making the world of Science Fiction reality.
Being part of The Best Australian Science Writing anthology means that I have sufficiently matured as a writer that I can convey the world of my research as clearly as I convey the world of astronomy.
No excuse me while I bounce off the walls with delight for a while.
Labels: homeopathy, public outreach, science, science communicators
Wednesday, June 20, 2012
Comet 96 P Machholz 1 Returns
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| Comet Machholz 1 at perihelion on 14 July, 2012 | The view from STEREO B on 14 July, both imagess generated in Celestia. |
Comet 96P/Machholz 1 is now brightening in the early morning sky in the Southern hemisphere. It's magnitude 11, and just under 30 degrees above the horizon in Eriandius at the moment, so you need a decent scope which can point close to the horizon to see it.
It will very rapidly be lost to Earth bound View as it whips around the Sun closer than Mercury. But It will be visible from at least one spacecraft. The comet should be visible from the SOHO LASCO C3 instrument Between July 12-17, and according to my projections, it should be visible from both STEREO A and B between July 13-15. It may get as bright as magnitude 2.
For some stunning STEREO images from the 2007 perihelion, go see Comet Al's blog.
As usual, I've made a Celestia file for Comet Machholz, just copy the text below into a file called Machhholz.ssc then save it into the extras folder and Robert is your avuncular relative.
For Stellarium 10.6 and up, just use the solar system plugin to download Machholz orbital elements.
==============>8 cut here===Machholz.ssc===>8 cut here============
"Machholz 1:96P" "Sol"
{
Class "comet" # Just copying the data for Halley
Mesh "halley.cmod"
Texture "asteroid.jpg"
Radius 3 # best guess at maximum semi-axis
MeshCenter [ -0.338 1.303 0.230 ]
EllipticalOrbit
{
Epoch 2456060.5 #2012-May-13
Period 5.2809388447549
SemiMajorAxis 3.032508014411316
Eccentricity 0.9591780641569885
Inclination 58.29867634073911
AscendingNode 94.32408165126535
ArgOfPericenter 14.75604312882846
MeanAnomaly 348.2820814381255
}
# Again, this data is copied straight from the ssc files for Halleys’ Comet
# chaotic rotation, imperfectly defined:
# this version from "The New Solar System", 4th Edition; Eds.
# JK Beatty, CC Petersen, A Chaikin
PrecessingRotation
{
Period 170 # 7.1 day axial rotation period
Inclination 66
PrecessionPeriod 3457004.12 # 3.7 day precession period
}
Albedo 0.8
}
============================>8====================================
Jupiter and the Crescent Moon 17 June 2012
Large amounts of ran suggest I'm not going to see Mercury and the crescent Moon tomorrow evening.
Still More Awesome Aurora Pictures
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These seriously awesome images above come from Graham Sanders (waves at Graham) of Kettering, Tasmania, and were taken at Trial Bay.I haven't mounted all his images (click to embiggen the ones I did) but will do the rest later on (remember, all images that I post here are copyright to their respective photographers, so ask if you want to use them).
The image to the left comes from Wayne Bigg from Mount Gambier, South Australia. If you want an animation, here is a time lapse animation taken at Flinders, Victoria from Alex Cherney covering 00:09-02:38 AEST, June 19th 2012:
http://youtu.be/K0Hl8Uty5Pk
Thanks to everyone who shared their images. We are still climbing towards Solar Maximum, so we should get a fair few more auroras in. Again, this was a fantastic show for an aurora storm that was a surprise!
Labels: astrophotography, aurora
Tuesday, June 19, 2012
The Sky This Week - Thursday June 21 to Thursday June 28
The First Quarter Moon is Wednesday June 27. Mars is in the western evening sky and is visited by the waxing Moon on the 26th. Saturn is visible near the star Spica in the northern sky. In the morning skies Jupiter and Venus can be seen. Mercury is close to the thin crescent Moon on the 21st. Earth is at Solstice on the 21st.
Morning sky on Sunday
June 24 looking east as seen from Adelaide at 6:30 am local
time in South Australia.
Jupiter is near the the Pleiades cluster. Venus is in the Hyades, making a second eye for Taurus the Bull. The inset shows the telescopic view of Venus. Similar views will be seen elsewhere at the equivalent local time (click to embiggen).
Jupiter climbs higher in the morning sky this week. It will become progressively easier to see. Jupiter is close to the Pleiades cluster. Over the week it draws away from them, and come closer to Venus and the Hyades.
Bright white Venus climbs higher above the horizon this week. Venus is a thin crescent seen through even a small telescope. Venus enters the "A" shaped Hyades cluster, and makes a second eye fro Taurus the Bull, along with the bright red star Aldebaran
Evening sky looking East as seen from Adelaide at 5:45 pm local time on Thursday June 21 showing
Mercury and the thin crescent Moon. Similar views will be seen
elsewhere at the equivalent local time. Click to embiggen.
The First Quarter Moon is Wednesday June 27.
Earth is at Solstice on the 21st. in the southern hemisphere, this is when the day is shortest and the night is longest.
Mercury rises higher in the evening sky. It is still best seen with a flat, uncluttered horizon. On the 21st Mercury is visited by the thin crescent Moon.
Mars enters the constellation of Virgo this week. It is the brightest object in the north-western sky, and its distinctive red colour makes it easy to spot. Mars is at its highest in the northern sky around 5:45 pm local time and sets shortly after 11:30 pm . The waxing Moon is close to Mars on Wednesday the 26th.
Mars comes closer to the bright star beta Virginis, and by the end of the week is less than half a finger width from it.
Mars was at opposition on March 4, when it was biggest and brightest as seen from Earth. Sadly, this is a poor opposition and Mars will be fairly small in modest telescopes.
Saturn is above the northern horizon, not far from the bright star Spica. Saturn is high enough in the northern sky for telescopic observation in the evening, being highest at 7:45 pm local time.Saturn was at opposition, when it is biggest and brightest as seen from Earth, on the 16th of April, but now is still a great time for telescopic views of this ringed world.
With Mars past opposition and Saturn still high in the sky, there are lots of interesting things in the sky to view with a telescope. If you don't have a telescope, now is a good time to visit one of your local astronomical societies open nights or the local planetariums.
Printable PDF maps of the Eastern sky at 10 pm AEDST, Western sky at 10 pm AEDST. For further details and more information on what's up in the sky, see Southern Skywatch.
Cloud cover predictions can be found at SkippySky.
Morning sky on Sunday
June 24 looking east as seen from Adelaide at 6:30 am local
time in South Australia. Jupiter is near the the Pleiades cluster. Venus is in the Hyades, making a second eye for Taurus the Bull. The inset shows the telescopic view of Venus. Similar views will be seen elsewhere at the equivalent local time (click to embiggen).
Jupiter climbs higher in the morning sky this week. It will become progressively easier to see. Jupiter is close to the Pleiades cluster. Over the week it draws away from them, and come closer to Venus and the Hyades.
Bright white Venus climbs higher above the horizon this week. Venus is a thin crescent seen through even a small telescope. Venus enters the "A" shaped Hyades cluster, and makes a second eye fro Taurus the Bull, along with the bright red star Aldebaran
Evening sky looking East as seen from Adelaide at 5:45 pm local time on Thursday June 21 showing
Mercury and the thin crescent Moon. Similar views will be seen
elsewhere at the equivalent local time. Click to embiggen.The First Quarter Moon is Wednesday June 27.
Earth is at Solstice on the 21st. in the southern hemisphere, this is when the day is shortest and the night is longest.
Mercury rises higher in the evening sky. It is still best seen with a flat, uncluttered horizon. On the 21st Mercury is visited by the thin crescent Moon.
Mars enters the constellation of Virgo this week. It is the brightest object in the north-western sky, and its distinctive red colour makes it easy to spot. Mars is at its highest in the northern sky around 5:45 pm local time and sets shortly after 11:30 pm . The waxing Moon is close to Mars on Wednesday the 26th.
Mars comes closer to the bright star beta Virginis, and by the end of the week is less than half a finger width from it.
Mars was at opposition on March 4, when it was biggest and brightest as seen from Earth. Sadly, this is a poor opposition and Mars will be fairly small in modest telescopes.
Saturn is above the northern horizon, not far from the bright star Spica. Saturn is high enough in the northern sky for telescopic observation in the evening, being highest at 7:45 pm local time.Saturn was at opposition, when it is biggest and brightest as seen from Earth, on the 16th of April, but now is still a great time for telescopic views of this ringed world.
With Mars past opposition and Saturn still high in the sky, there are lots of interesting things in the sky to view with a telescope. If you don't have a telescope, now is a good time to visit one of your local astronomical societies open nights or the local planetariums.
Printable PDF maps of the Eastern sky at 10 pm AEDST, Western sky at 10 pm AEDST. For further details and more information on what's up in the sky, see Southern Skywatch.
Cloud cover predictions can be found at SkippySky.
Labels: weekly sky
Carnival of Space #254 is Here!
Carnival of Space #254 is now up at Starry Critters. There's planning New Years celebrations on Venus and Mercury, Pinups in Space, Voyager 1 leaving the Solar System, Science Ficton and Solar Sails and much, much more. Sail on over and have a read.
Labels: carnival of space
Monday, June 18, 2012
The Transit of Venus, The Movie
The Transit of Venus movie from iTelescope.Net, the Research School of Astronomy and Astrophysics and the Australian Astronomical Observatory. The live webcast from Siding Spring was made into a Youtube video by Peter Lake.
Enjoy.
Enjoy.
Labels: iTelescope, transit, Venus
Round Up of Last Nights Aurora
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| Annie Benham sends in this great photo from Tasmania. This was her first aurora, even though she has lived in Tasmania for18 years. | Paul Albers sent in this beautiful photo from Pt. Leo in southern Victoria. |
Last nights aurora caught me by surprise, the coronal mass ejection had hit the previous day, and the IPS space weather site was quiet, then the Aurora Australis Facebook page and Southern Aurora listserve started coming out with reports of aurora.
Although the weather was poor with lots of cloud cover, people were soon coming in with reports of amazing sky sights. I even got a report from Mount Gambier in South Australia! Sadly nothing happened in Adelaide. As the night wound on the internet resounded with delighted cries as glowing pillars broke through gaps in the cloud. The spectacle eventually died down around 11 pm.
All through this the IPS site carried on as if no aurora were happening at all.
As well as the images sent to me above (remember, copyright is vested with the people who took them, so play nice) there are some fantastic images for the Tasmanians.
Julie Head has this lovely image from the Forth Valley.
Ian Stewart got this beauty at the boat launch at Tinderbox overlooking Bruny Island.
Maureen Johnston's fantastic shot was taken at Howden.
Rick Keen has a stunning shot from Mt Wellington, looking over Kingston.
The solar cycle is still ramping up, so we may have a few more of these events in the near future.
Labels: astrophotography, aurora
After The Rain
Sunday, June 17, 2012
Speaking of Indigenous Skies....
The Adelaide Planetarium at the University of South Australia is presenting, as part of their 40th Anniversary celebrations, "Aboriginal Skies" with Paul Curnow. You can see Paul talking about Aboriginal skies here.
From their email to me:
"Come and learn how to find the different constellations (stellar patterns) as seen by indigenous groups around Australia. Hear about the Dreaming stories that relate to the night sky. Learn about how constellations like the Southern Cross and Orion are seen by Aboriginal Australians. The evening is strictly designed for the adult beginner, with little or no astronomical knowledge who would like to know more about the night sky and the constellations, as seen by the Aboriginal Peoples of Australia."Seats are running out fast: Saturday 30th of June 2012 at 7:30pm – 9:30pm
Adelaide Planetarium,
Building P
Mawson Lakes Campus,
University of South Australia
Cost $30.00 per person. Enrolments are subject to the seating capacity of the planetarium. To make a booking or for further information phone 8302 3138 or email the planetarium at adelaide.planetarium@unisa.edu.au.
Labels: Astronomy, miscelaneous
Aurora Happening in Tasmania Now! (9:36 AEST)
Aurora are happening in Tasmania now! (See picture here) Tasmanians and Southern New Zealanders should look to the south now (preferably from dark sky sites). More cool images here and here.
Labels: aurora
A Tale of Larnankurrk and Kulkunbulla
Unfortunately most of the Indigenous lore of South-Eastern Australia is lost. Still we have some stories. This one comes from the Boorong peoples of north-west Victoria.
The stars we know as the belt and sword of Orion (or the Saucepan, here in Australia) are Kulkunbulla, a group of young men dancing a corroboree. Larnankurrk, the group of stars we know as the Pleiades, is a group of young women watching th young men dance. Gellarlec (Aldebaran) is an old man singing and beating time to the dancing. Gellarlecis also known as the Major Mitchell Cockatoo.
See Paul Curnow's Boorong Skies for more information.
Labels: constellations, miscelaneous
Still More NEO 2012 LZ1
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| NEO 2012 LZ1 at 7:53 UT, nearly 9 hours after closest approach. 5x120 second Images taken with iTelescope T5. The images were stretched in FITSliberator, then stacked in ImageJ and a Max intensity Z project made, then despeckeled. | NEO 2012 LZ1 two hours later, zipping through star clouds. Processing as for the earlier image. |
These look to be my final images of the NEO 2012 LZ1, taken with the New Mexico T5 instrument nearly 9 and 11 hours after the asteroids closest approach.This is a much narrower FOV instrument that T14 and T16. A big thank you to Jeff Woods of iTelescope who adjusted the travel of T5 so we could take earlier images.
I'll now do some astrometry on these images to help refine the asteroids orbit.
There is a nice article at Universe Today which features one of my images, and here's a nice animation by Peter Lake using iTelescope T11. My other shots and animations of this asteroid are here, here and here.
My animation here
Labels: animation, asteroids, FITSLiberator, imageJ, iTelescope
Saturday, June 16, 2012
Near Earth Asteroid 2012 LZ1 10:10 UT, 15 June 2012
2012 LZ1 imaged with iTelescope T14 on June 15, 2012 10:10 UT. The image is a stack of 7x120 second exposures, stretched in FITS Liberator and stacked with ImageJ. Click to embiggen (it's not as big as my previous image, but worth it)NEO 2012 LZ1 was imaged here at 10:10 UT, nearly 11 hours after its closest approach of 13-14 lunar-distances (that's the distance between the Earth and the Moon, 0.036 AU) on June 14 23:10 UT. The asteroid is just zipping past the faint globular cluster PAL 11 when this series of images were taken.
I was trying for a longer series of images to make a really cool animation, but the oncoming twilight put paid to that.
Here's my animation.
Labels: animation, asteroids, FITSLiberator, imageJ, iTelescope, NEO
Friday, June 15, 2012
Near Earth Asteroid 2012 LZ1 1:45 UT, 15 June 2012
2012 LZ1 was imaged at 1:45 UT after its closest approach of 13-14 lunar-distances (that's the distance between the Earth and the Moon, 0.036 AU) on June 14 23:10 UT. The asteroid had just zipped past Barnard's Galaxy and the Little Gem Nebula when this series of images were taken.
Here's my animation.
Labels: asteroids, astrophotography, FITSLiberator, imageJ, iTelescope, NEO
Possible Aurora June 16-17 2012
An incoming Coronal Mass Ejection is expected to hit Earth on June 16th around 10:16 UT (that's 20:16 or 8:16 pm AEST).
Space weather predicts mild to moderate geomagnetic storms, with the possibility of aurora in high latitudes, IPS predicts merely "unsettled" for the 16th and 17th.
People in Tasmanian and Southern New Zealand should start looking to the south any-time after 8:00 pm, although often storms do not eventuate until late in the night around midnight or early morning the following day. Dark sky conditions are excellent for seeing aurora, should they occur.
Space weather predicts mild to moderate geomagnetic storms, with the possibility of aurora in high latitudes, IPS predicts merely "unsettled" for the 16th and 17th.
People in Tasmanian and Southern New Zealand should start looking to the south any-time after 8:00 pm, although often storms do not eventuate until late in the night around midnight or early morning the following day. Dark sky conditions are excellent for seeing aurora, should they occur.
Labels: aurora
Near Earth Asteroid 2012 LZ1 14 June 2012
2012 LZ1 is a large Near-Earth Object (NEO) approximately 300-700 metres in size.
It was discovered by Rob McNaught on June 10th 2012 from the Uppsala Telescope at Siding Spring Observatory.
2012 LZ1 will be at its closest approach of 13-14 lunar-distances (that's the distance between the Earth and the Moon, 0.036 AU) on June 14 23:10 UT according to the latest MPEC ephemeris. That's 9:10 am AEST, but don't worry it will sill be visible from Southern skies when night falls, althoug at magnitude 14 you will need a grunty system to image it.
Here's an animation from Nick Howes and team. Here's an image from Kevin Deakes also taken with T14 on the 14th.
Unlike the recent NEOs 2012 LZ1 is far enough away that a planetarium program will not have too great a parallax error (although the topocentric coordinates will always be better).
Here's my animation.
Thursday, June 14, 2012
Speaking of Solargraphy and the David Malin Awards
If you are in Adelaide, the 2011 winning images from the David Malin Awards are on display from Tuesday 5 June 2012 to Friday 13 July 2012 at the RiAUS at the Science Exchange (55 Exchange Place, Adelaide SA 5000).The Junior Winner had posted some of her Lunar Eclipse images on the very blog.
As well as some stunning astrophotgraphy, the exhibition will feature some of the best solargraphy project images. Hopefully some of my friends kids images got in.
Labels: astrophotography, science communicators
Entries for the The 2012 CWAS "David Malin Awards" Close Soon.
Entries for the the 2012 CWAS "David Malin Awards" close on midnight, this Friday June 15. This is the is the premier Australian Astrophotography competition. Last year the Junior competition was won by a young lady who had posted some of her Lunar Eclipse images here. This year I'm sure some of you have plenty of Venus Transit images that just might be eligible.
Conditions of entry are here and click here to submit an entry.
Go to it folks!
Conditions of entry are here and click here to submit an entry.
Go to it folks!
Labels: astrophotography, competition
Tuesday, June 12, 2012
The Sky This Week - Thursday June 14 to Thursday June 21
The New Moon is Wednesday June 20. Mars is in the
western evening sky. Saturn is visible near the
star Spica in the northern sky. In the morning skies Jupiter, Venus and the crescent Moon are close on June 17 and 18. Mercury is close to the thin crescent Moon on the 21st. Earth is at Solstice on the 21st.
Morning sky on Sunday
June 17 looking east as seen from Adelaide at 6:30 am local
time in South Australia.
Jupiter is near the thin crescent Moon, not far from the Pleiades cluster. Venus is close to the horizon. The inset shows the telescopic view of Venus. Similar views will be seen elsewhere at the equivalent local time (click to embiggen).
Jupiter climbs higher in the morning sky this week. It will become progressively easier to see, but is still best if you have a fairly flat, uncluttered horizon. On the 17th, the thin crescent Moon, Jupiter and the Peliades cluster make a nice sight. If you have a level horizon, with the Hyades and Venus below make it makes a fantastic picture.
Bright white Venus is just above the horizon this week. Venus is a thin crescent seen through even a small telescope. If you have a clear level horizon you can see the thin crescent Moon close to it on the 18th.
Evening sky looking East as seen from Adelaide at 5:45 pm local time on Thursday June 21 showing
Mercury and the thin crescent Moon. Similar views will be seen
elsewhere at the equivalent local time. Click to embiggen.
The New Moon is Wednesday June 20. Earth is at Solstice on the 21st. in the southern hemisphere, this is when the day is shortest and the night is longest.
Mercury rises higher in the evening sky. It is still best seen with a flat, uncluttered horizon. On the 21st Mercury is visited by the thin crescent Moon.
Mars is in the constellation of Leo but will enter the constellation of Virgo next week. It is the brightest object in the north-western sky, and its distinctive red colour makes it easy to spot. Mars is rising before sunset and is at its highest in the northern sky around 6:00 pm local time.
Mars leaves behind the bright star sigma Leonis and heads towards beta Virginis.
Mars was at opposition on March 4, when it was biggest and brightest as seen from Earth. Sadly, this is a poor opposition and Mars will be fairly small in modest telescopes.
Saturn is above the northern horizon, not far from the bright star Spica. Saturn is high enough in the northern sky for telescopic observation in the evening, being highest at 8:45 pm local time.Saturn was at opposition, when it is biggest and brightest as seen from Earth, on the 16th of April, but now is still a great time for telescopic views of this ringed world.
With Mars past opposition and Saturn high in the sky, there are lots of interesting things in the sky to view with a telescope. If you don't have a telescope, now is a good time to visit one of your local astronomical societies open nights or the local planetariums.
Printable PDF maps of the Eastern sky at 10 pm AEDST, Western sky at 10 pm AEDST. For further details and more information on what's up in the sky, see Southern Skywatch.
Cloud cover predictions can be found at SkippySky.
Morning sky on Sunday
June 17 looking east as seen from Adelaide at 6:30 am local
time in South Australia. Jupiter is near the thin crescent Moon, not far from the Pleiades cluster. Venus is close to the horizon. The inset shows the telescopic view of Venus. Similar views will be seen elsewhere at the equivalent local time (click to embiggen).
Jupiter climbs higher in the morning sky this week. It will become progressively easier to see, but is still best if you have a fairly flat, uncluttered horizon. On the 17th, the thin crescent Moon, Jupiter and the Peliades cluster make a nice sight. If you have a level horizon, with the Hyades and Venus below make it makes a fantastic picture.
Bright white Venus is just above the horizon this week. Venus is a thin crescent seen through even a small telescope. If you have a clear level horizon you can see the thin crescent Moon close to it on the 18th.
Evening sky looking East as seen from Adelaide at 5:45 pm local time on Thursday June 21 showing
Mercury and the thin crescent Moon. Similar views will be seen
elsewhere at the equivalent local time. Click to embiggen.The New Moon is Wednesday June 20. Earth is at Solstice on the 21st. in the southern hemisphere, this is when the day is shortest and the night is longest.
Mercury rises higher in the evening sky. It is still best seen with a flat, uncluttered horizon. On the 21st Mercury is visited by the thin crescent Moon.
Mars is in the constellation of Leo but will enter the constellation of Virgo next week. It is the brightest object in the north-western sky, and its distinctive red colour makes it easy to spot. Mars is rising before sunset and is at its highest in the northern sky around 6:00 pm local time.
Mars leaves behind the bright star sigma Leonis and heads towards beta Virginis.
Mars was at opposition on March 4, when it was biggest and brightest as seen from Earth. Sadly, this is a poor opposition and Mars will be fairly small in modest telescopes.
Saturn is above the northern horizon, not far from the bright star Spica. Saturn is high enough in the northern sky for telescopic observation in the evening, being highest at 8:45 pm local time.Saturn was at opposition, when it is biggest and brightest as seen from Earth, on the 16th of April, but now is still a great time for telescopic views of this ringed world.
With Mars past opposition and Saturn high in the sky, there are lots of interesting things in the sky to view with a telescope. If you don't have a telescope, now is a good time to visit one of your local astronomical societies open nights or the local planetariums.
Printable PDF maps of the Eastern sky at 10 pm AEDST, Western sky at 10 pm AEDST. For further details and more information on what's up in the sky, see Southern Skywatch.
Cloud cover predictions can be found at SkippySky.
Labels: weekly sky
Monday, June 11, 2012
Still More Venus Transit Awesomeness
There is still more Venus Transit awesomeness out on the web. You may have seen some of these before, but they bear revisiting.
Firstly, run, don't walk to see Thierry Legault's amazing image of the
Then there is the Hinode image of Venus's atmosphere being backlit by the Sun, which made Astronomy Post of the Day.
Another Astronomy Post of the Day was this image of Venus on the rising Sun. And here's another great Venus Sunrise from Will Gater.
Ice in Space has a magnificent image of the week with Venus transiting the Sun in Hydrogen Alpha light. The ABC's Transit of Venus page has an image gallery and videos as well.
Labels: astrophotography, transit, Venus
Farewell Beautiful Comet C/2009 P1 Garradd
Comet Garradd, after delighting us for months with it's beautiful double tails, is now sinking towards the horizon and is below the range of the iTelescopes travel. This image was taken before astronomical twilight, but soon it will be too low even for that.
While never getting brighter than magnitude 6, Comet C/2009 P1 Garradd went through some beautiful regions, and its ever changing aspect was really delightful.
The comet will return in October at magnitude 12.4, but if you wish to remember this delightful little comet, you can browse the images I have here.
Labels: astrophotography, C/2009 P1 Garradd, comet, comets, FITSLiberator, imageJ, iTelescope
Carnival of Space #253 is Here
Carnival of Space #253 is now up at The Next Big Future. The Transit of Venus dominates of course, but there is also mini fusion space drives, the science of black holes, the anniversary of Mariner 2 and much much more. Head on over for a read.
Labels: carnival of space
Sunday, June 10, 2012
Images from My Transit of Venus, June 6 2012
|  |
| My first image of Venus at 10:26 am ACST when the clouds had broken. | Near mid transit at 11:04 am. The varying colours are due to the cameras auto exposure function, and its lag when clouds come over. |
 | 
|
| After a cloud interlude, Venus approaches the Sun's limb | Just before 3rd contact at 1:52 pm ACST |
I had great plans for the Transit of Venus on June 6 2012, the last until 2117. I had made a binocular projection system, I had my 4" Newtonian telescope with a glass aperture solar filter, a home-made Baader filter for my 8" Newtonian telescope and a mini Baader filter for my Olympus camera.Wednesday dawned cloudy. Actually, when I first woke up the sky was mostly clear, but huge slabs of cloud moved over where the Sun would be shortly before Sunrise, ending any hope I had of seeing first and second contact.
This was the pattern for the day, large parts of the sky would be sparkly blue, except where the Sun was. Due to the weather I made a decision to only use the binocular projection system and my 4" Newtonian scope, as these systems could be moved around a lot more quickly than the homogeneously heavy 8". Also, although I have a time drive on the 8", it drifts slowly. With brief patches of blue coming over the Sun at short, widely spaced intervals, the time to realign the scope would be too long to catch the breaks. So I stuck with the simpler systems.
An added complication was that SmallestOne was sick and had to stay home too. He wasn't THAT sick, well enough to watch TV and play computer games, but I still had to keep an eye on him and give him his medications at the prescribed times. So I divided my time between moaning at the clouds, looking after SmallestOne, watching the live webcasts and rushing out when gaps in the cloud came up.
I had a great Transit. I took heaps of shots through the 4" scope. Most were useless, with cloud coming over just as I was imaging, or the scope shaking with the wind. Getting the focus right was a pain too. But I could watch the progress of the transit with the binocular projection system easily while I fiddled with the camera.Some people came over and I showed them the transit with the projection system (I had to move quickly to stop one person trying to look through the eyepiece rather than at the card the image was projected on. Even SmallestOne came out and had a look (he wasn't impressed). Compare this transit with my Transit experience in 2004.
Even though I thought I had carefully placed my scope, just as third contact was coming up, the Sun went behind a tree. So I rapidly moved the scope and binoculars, and hurriedly realigned and refocused in time to see Venus approach the Sun's limb.
And the clouds came over again.
Nonetheless, I was able to get sufficient shots to see third contact and just before fouth contact (I though I had 4th contact but I was fooled by the low magnification image). I have made the final series of images into the animation below. It's a bit jerky as at lot of frames were unusable due to cloud. The weird tiny black speckles are due to the GIF to AVI translation. Images taken using infinity to infinity imaging a Canon IXUS and a 4" reflector with aperture filter and 25 mm eye piece, the camera was held in place by a commercial adapter (see image of the scope above).
Animation of third and fourth contact. Images were imported into GIMP as layers, aligned using the difference function and manual alignment, the cropped, exported as an animated GIF, then converted to AVI with ImageJ.
Reflecting after it was all over, what was really good was the degree to which the astronomical community, both amateur and professional, put a lot of time into making sure the general public got to experience the transit, either by making their won projection systems, public outreach events or webcast. As well as thoroughly enjoying my own experience, I'm glad I could help in some small way to let others experience it.
Labels: animation, astrophotography, gimp, imageJ, transit, Venus
Friday, June 08, 2012
Other Peoples Transit of Venus Images and Videos
I'm still processing my images, so I thought I'd put up links to fantastic images that people have sent me or pointed me to. Cynthia Ma's image to the left is great.
Comet Al has a brilliant series of images and a great animation taken using a simple projection system.
Rob Kaufmann has a wonderful shot from Bright Victoria, he had less luck with second contact due to turbulence as this video shows. Chris Wyatt has a great video of second contact from Burren Junction, NSW. Chris of SiriusCybernetics has some great shots. Hristo Pavlov got some nice images from Sydney despite the weather. Adam Marsh has a nice series of photos. Roland Gesthuizen has a great Storify essay.
In the international section a good video from Taiwan. The transit of Venus with a seagull http://flic.kr/p/bUB2bF and with a plane http://flic.kr/p/bUBcP8. A cloudy one from Dorset by Stuart http://flic.kr/p/cbY8bb and of course a huge Flickr gallery http://www.flickr.com/photos/tags/transitofvenus/
The Bad Astronomer has a great Transit gallery too.
UPDATE: I forgot Andrew Thomas' stunning images at his blog, Dennis Persyk's transit images and astronomy boy's transit images. Sorry folks!
Labels: astrophotography, Cynthia Ma, transit, Venus
Thursday, June 07, 2012
A Martian Chronicler Has Died
Ray Bradbury, Science Fiction writer and visionary, has died at the age of 91. As an impressionable young lad I fervently read his stores along with Isaac Asimov, Robert Heinlein, Arthur C Clarke, Andre Norton and Ursla K LeGuin. Reading the dystopian trio "Fahrenheit 451", "1984" and "Brave New World" back to back was a significant milestone, three visions so compelling, but so different. Of all of them, I think Bradbury's infotainment society has come closest to fulfilment. Some good tributes to the Man can be found at the Planetary Society and i09.
Labels: miscelaneous
Wednesday, June 06, 2012
The Sky This Week - Thursday June 7 to Thursday June 14
The Last Quarter Moon is Monday June 11. Mars is in the
western evening sky. Saturn is visible near the
star Spica. Jupiter and Mercury return to the morning and evening skies respectively.
Morning sky on Sunday
June 10 looking east as seen from Adelaide at 6:45 am local
time in South Australia.
Jupiter is above the horizon, not far from the Pleiades cluster. Similar views will be seen elsewhere at the equivalent local time (click to embiggen).
Jupiter returns to the morning sky this week. It will be hard to see until late in the week, but if you have a fairly flat, uncluttered horizon it will look quite nice in the early twilight.
Bright white Venus is is lost in the twilight but will be seen juts peeping over the horizon by the end of the week.
Evening sky looking North as seen from Adelaide at 10:00 pm local time on Saturday June 9 showing
Mars, Saturn and Spica. Similar views will be seen
elsewhere at the equivalent local time. Click to embiggen.
The Last Quarter Moon is Monday June 11.
Mars is in the constellation of Leo but is now heading swiftly for the constellation of Virgo. It is the brightest object in the north-western sky, and its distinctive red colour makes it easy to spot. Mars is rising before sunset and is at its highest in the northern sky around 6:15 pm local time.
Mars is close to the bright star sigma Leonis by the end of the week.
Mars was at opposition on March 4, when it was biggest and brightest as seen from Earth. Sadly, this is a poor opposition and Mars will be fairly small in modest telescopes.
Saturn is above the northern horizon, not far from the bright star Spica. Saturn is high enough in the northern sky for telescopic observation in the evening, being highest at 9:00 pm local time. local time. Saturn was at opposition, when it is biggest and brightest as seen from Earth, on the 16th of April, but now is still a great time for telescopic views of this ringed world. On Friday June 1 Saturn, Spica and the Moon form a nice triangle in the sky.
Mercury returns to the evening sky and by the end of the week can be seen low above the westen sky shortly after sunset. Best seen with a flat, uncluttered horizon. .
Have you seen the Emu? The Emu is an aboriginal constellation composed of dark clouds in the Milky Way. Best seen far away from the city lights, outer suburbs may also see it in the early evening before the Moon rises.
With Mars past opposition and Saturn high in the sky, there are lots of interesting things in the sky to view with a telescope. If you don't have a telescope, now is a good time to visit one of your local astronomical societies open nights or the local planetariums.
Printable PDF maps of the Eastern sky at 10 pm AEDST, Western sky at 10 pm AEDST. For further details and more information on what's up in the sky, see Southern Skywatch.
Cloud cover predictions can be found at SkippySky.
Morning sky on Sunday
June 10 looking east as seen from Adelaide at 6:45 am local
time in South Australia. Jupiter is above the horizon, not far from the Pleiades cluster. Similar views will be seen elsewhere at the equivalent local time (click to embiggen).
Jupiter returns to the morning sky this week. It will be hard to see until late in the week, but if you have a fairly flat, uncluttered horizon it will look quite nice in the early twilight.
Bright white Venus is is lost in the twilight but will be seen juts peeping over the horizon by the end of the week.
Evening sky looking North as seen from Adelaide at 10:00 pm local time on Saturday June 9 showing
Mars, Saturn and Spica. Similar views will be seen
elsewhere at the equivalent local time. Click to embiggen.The Last Quarter Moon is Monday June 11.
Mars is in the constellation of Leo but is now heading swiftly for the constellation of Virgo. It is the brightest object in the north-western sky, and its distinctive red colour makes it easy to spot. Mars is rising before sunset and is at its highest in the northern sky around 6:15 pm local time.
Mars is close to the bright star sigma Leonis by the end of the week.
Mars was at opposition on March 4, when it was biggest and brightest as seen from Earth. Sadly, this is a poor opposition and Mars will be fairly small in modest telescopes.
Saturn is above the northern horizon, not far from the bright star Spica. Saturn is high enough in the northern sky for telescopic observation in the evening, being highest at 9:00 pm local time. local time. Saturn was at opposition, when it is biggest and brightest as seen from Earth, on the 16th of April, but now is still a great time for telescopic views of this ringed world. On Friday June 1 Saturn, Spica and the Moon form a nice triangle in the sky.
Mercury returns to the evening sky and by the end of the week can be seen low above the westen sky shortly after sunset. Best seen with a flat, uncluttered horizon. .
With Mars past opposition and Saturn high in the sky, there are lots of interesting things in the sky to view with a telescope. If you don't have a telescope, now is a good time to visit one of your local astronomical societies open nights or the local planetariums.
Printable PDF maps of the Eastern sky at 10 pm AEDST, Western sky at 10 pm AEDST. For further details and more information on what's up in the sky, see Southern Skywatch.
Cloud cover predictions can be found at SkippySky.
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